Tibau, looking for his fourth straight win and sixth in his last seven bouts, dropped a 30-27 sweep of the judges’ scorecards against Khabib Nurmagomedov, scores that seemed to come as a surprise to many in attendance.

The preliminary-card bout was part of Saturday’s UFC 148 event at MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. It aired on FX prior to the night’s pay-per-view main card.

The story of the fight was Nurmagomedov’s takedown attempts and Tibau’s perfect defense of them. Nurmagomedov continually looked to take the fight to the canvas. But Tibau defended every takedown, keeping the fight mostly on the feet.

But it was on the feet where Nurmagomedov appeared to be the most dangerous against the bigger Tibau, whose fighting weight is among the largest in the lightweight division. Nurmagomedov often threw strikes with wild abandon, and some of them were on the mark – and that likely was the difference for the judges, who saw it unanimously for Nurmagomedov in every round.

It was Tibau who kept a careful and cautious pace, trying to avoid most of the Nurmagomedov haymakers. But it perhaps was that cautious pace that worked against him in the eyes of the judges, who may have rewarded Nurmagomedov for his aggression despite not being able to score on his takedown attempts.

“The record wasn’t really that important to me,” Nurmagomedov said. “It was more about getting this victory – it was very important. It’s my second fight in the UFC. I had to get it. I think that my speed, agility and endurance was more to my advantage. He’s had a lot more fights than I’ve had, but I’m younger and hungrier.”

Tibau said he could see where Nurmagomedov was scoring points with the judges.

“It was a hard fight,” Tibau said. “He controlled the fight a little more up against the cage so there were a lot of moments where it was tough to shake him off.”

Nurmagomedov (18-0 MMA, 2-0 UFC) remained unbeaten in his MMA career, improving to 2-0 since his first UFC fight this past January. Tibau (25-8 MMA, 10-6 UFC) lost for the first time since a September 2010 setback to Jim Miller.